Well, it’s not quite a perfect first look, as these photos of Rooney Mara only show her partway through the transformation into the tatted and pierced Lisbeth Salander from The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Apparently snapped while the actress was doing motorcycle training for the role, these pics at least give you the basic idea of the new version of the character.

Pale, with severely cut hair; just mentally add the ink and piercings and you can surmise that David Fincher and his crew might be finding a point somewhere between the Salander of the books and that of the Swedish film version. (Where Noomi Rapace played the character.)

The film shoots soon in Sweden, and is planned for release on December 21, 2011. So you can have a little sexual horror for Christmas. More after the break.